Articles from Menlo Ventures

Menlo Ventures Raises $3B for AI as Silicon Valley VC Marks 50 Years
MENLO PARK, Calif., June 23, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Menlo Ventures today announced $3 billion in new capital to back promising AI companies at every stage, across the AI stack, from infrastructure and frontier technologies to AI-native applications in enterprise, healthcare, and consumer markets.Menlo Ventures XVII, the firm’s flagship venture fund, invests in seed and Series A rounds, while Menlo Inflection IV provides growth capital to companies scaling rapidly at Series B and beyond. “AI is creating one of the largest technology platform shifts we’ll see in this lifetime,” said Matt Murphy, Partner at Menlo Ventures. “What makes this moment unique is the speed and breadth of the change. But it’s still very early—incredibly early—and many of the defining AI companies of the next decade have yet to be built. These funds give us the capital and flexibility to partner with founders from company formation through hypergrowth.” A VC Firm Built for the AI Era More than three years ago, Menlo made a deliberate decision to reorganize around AI. The firm recognized ChatGPT’s launch as the beginning of a massive platform shift that would reshape the entire technology stack and global economy. While much of the market was still assessing the implications of generative AI, Menlo began assembling the team and defining the strategy to meet the moment: recruiting investors with deep technical, product, and operating expertise, conducting primary research on the uses of AI, and investing across the AI stack. That strategy informed the firm’s investing, beginning with Anthropic. Menlo first invested in Anthropic in 2023, when the company was pre-product and pre-revenue, and many believed the foundation model market had already been decided. However, the firm believed there was room for another independent foundation model company and saw Anthropic as an early anchor for a broader AI strategy. A year later, Menlo Ventures led the Series D and, that summer, launched the Anthology Fund, an AI innovation fund, in partnership with Anthropic, giving Menlo early access to emerging ideas, talented AI innovators, and critical infrastructure defining the forefront of AI.From there, Menlo invested across the infrastructure layer with companies including Axiom, Chai Discovery, Goodfire, Neon, OpenRouter, and Skild AI, and expanded into applications as the market matured through investments in companies including Eve, Higgsfield, Legora, Lovable, Manifest OS, OpenEvidence, Semgrep, Suno, and Wispr Flow. “Strong portfolios attract strong founders. That’s the compounding power of a best-in-class AI portfolio,” said Venky Ganesan, Partner at Menlo Ventures. “Every company we back makes the whole network smarter, and that edge flows to every founder in the portfolio. In today’s market, the best AI founders have their choice of investors; being close to the companies defining the category is an advantage capital alone can’t buy.”Fifty Years of Being Early For fifty years, Menlo has understood the gravitational pull of new technology waves before others did, moving early to back the foundational companies that would define each era. The firm incubated Gilead Sciences before biotech became a defining sector of modern healthcare, backed Siri years before voice became a mainstream interface, backed Hotmail, one of the first free web apps to prove that consumer products could build massive audiences on the internet, funded Roku before streaming reshaped entertainment, led an early round in Uber when it was unclear whether ridesharing could scale beyond black cars in San Francisco, and backed Anthropic before it had a product in market.Menlo Ventures’ early conviction around AI, deep technical expertise and industry knowledge, and portfolio depth have positioned it as a leading voice in the space.
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · June 23, 2026
Menlo Ventures Announces Promotion of Deborah Carrillo to Partner
Carrillo’s promotion reflects Menlo Ventures’ commitment to strengthening its leadership bench and supporting the firm’s long-term growth.
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · January 5, 2026
Menlo Ventures’ 2025 State of Generative AI Report: Enterprise Investment Hit $37B in 2025, Tripling in One Year
AI Applications are the Fastest-Growing Software Category in History, Capturing 6% of the Market in Just Three Years
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · December 9, 2025
Healthcare Adopts AI 2.2x Faster than Other Industries, Driving Record $1.4B in AI Spending
Startups now capture 85% of healthcare AI spend outpacing incumbents, according to Menlo Ventures' survey of 700+ senior executives spanning providers, payers, pharma, and biotech
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · October 21, 2025
Menlo Ventures Promotes Deedy Das to Partner Amid AI Investment Surge
Das’ elevation underscores Menlo Ventures’ commitment to backing technical founders building the next frontier of AI
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · September 15, 2025
Enterprise LLM Spend Reaches $8.4B as Anthropic Overtakes OpenAI, According to New Menlo Ventures Report on LLM Market
MENLO PARK, Calif., July 31, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Enterprise spending on large language models (LLM) has more than doubled in just six months, rising from $3.5 billion in late 2024, to $8.4 billion, according to a new report released today by Menlo Ventures.
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · July 31, 2025
Menlo Ventures’ 2025 Consumer AI Report: $12B Market, 1.8 Billion Global Users Signal AI’s Mainstream Moment
Over 60% of Americans use AI—including more than half of all parents and a third of Boomers—but only 3% pay highlighting untapped revenue potential
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · June 26, 2025
Matt Kraning Joins Menlo Ventures as Partner to Drive AI Investments
Former Expanse Co-founder and CTO Brings Deep Technical Expertise to Menlo Ventures’ Expanding AI, Infrastructure, and SaaS Portfolio
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · April 10, 2025
Menlo Ventures Announces Cohort Backed by the $100M Anthology Fund Launched in Partnership with Anthropic
18 Companies Selected From Thousands of Applicants Receive Funding, Access to Anthropic Technology including Claude Credits and Menlo Ventures’ Company-Building Expertise
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · December 18, 2024
Menlo Ventures’ 2024 State of Generative AI Report Reveals 6x Spike in Enterprise Spending as Market Leaders Shift
Enterprise AI Spending Hits $13.8B and Anthropic Doubles Market Share While OpenAI Shows Sharp Decline According to New Market Research From Menlo Ventures
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · November 20, 2024
Menlo Ventures and Anthropic Launch $100M Anthology Fund to Accelerate AI Innovation
MENLO PARK, Calif., July 17, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Menlo Ventures, a leading venture capital firm, today announced the Anthology Fund, a groundbreaking $100 million initiative created in partnership with Anthropic, the frontier artificial intelligence safety and research company. The Anthology Fund aims to partner with innovative founders to build unique AI-first applications and infrastructure solutions that leverage Anthropic’s technology and AI models.
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · July 17, 2024
Menlo Ventures Hires Rama Sekhar as Partner
Veteran technology investor and engineer brings expertise in cybersecurity, AI, and cloud infrastructure to the firm’s investment team
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · January 24, 2024
Menlo Ventures Closes $1.35 Billion to Invest in Companies Leading the AI Transformation
MENLO PARK, Calif., Nov. 16, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Today, Menlo Ventures, a leading venture capital firm, announced the firm has raised $1.35 billion in new capital that will be invested by Menlo’s flagship venture fund Menlo XVI and Menlo Inflection III and their affiliated funds, with a mandate to invest in promising technology companies leading the AI transformation.
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · November 16, 2023
Menlo Ventures’ State of Generative AI in the Enterprise Reveals New Data on Sentiment and Adoption Rates, Highlighting Opportunities for Startups
Research shows enterprise generative AI budgets are surprisingly small, and incumbents have an advantage
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · November 13, 2023
Menlo Ventures Hires Former Atlassian CPO Joff Redfern as Newest Partner
Veteran Product and Technology Leader Brings Operating Experience and Product Perspective to Investment Team
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · September 7, 2023
Menlo Ventures Recruits New Partner Amy Wu to Expand Consumer Practice
Amy Wu Will Build on the Firm’s Impressive History of Consumer Investments in Chime, Roku, Uber
By Menlo Ventures · Via GlobeNewswire · June 15, 2023
Articles from Menlo Ventures | MarketMinute